


i hear you calling in the dead of night

by spaceburgers



Series: birthright [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Birthright Spoilers, Canonical Character Death, M/M, Post-Birthright, awakening names used
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-20
Updated: 2016-05-20
Packaged: 2018-06-09 15:30:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6912928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceburgers/pseuds/spaceburgers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Inigo wakes up, they tell him that the war is over.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i hear you calling in the dead of night

**Author's Note:**

> for jc.
> 
> specifically follows up from chapter 26 of birthright, but also makes references to endgame.
> 
> title from overjoyed by bastille.

When Inigo wakes up, they tell him that the war is over.

It takes a moment for him to remember. He wakes up looking at a wooden ceiling—the infirmary of Castle Krakenburg, he realizes. The grain of the wood is familiar to him, as is the sickly smell of herbs and salves. The ache in his bones is familiar too; it speaks of battle and injury and, more importantly, survival.

When he turns he sees Owain, perched uncomfortably on a stool next to the bed. He has his head bowed, the bridge of his nose pressed against both hands, clasped together as if in prayer. He is not looking at Inigo.

“What’s the matter, old friend?” he says. He is surprised by how raspy his voice is—disuse. Exactly how long has he been asleep? He realizes he does not know the answer to this question.

Owain shifts, lifts his head to look at him. His eyes are rimmed with red; he looks exhausted. The last time Inigo saw him look this way they were getting ready to leave their world, so soon after peace had been brought upon the realm. Owain had been sitting the same way then, hunched over, silent. Inigo remembers thinking how strange the sight had been: Owain, so full of unnecessary energy and flamboyance and grandiloquence, reduced to a shell of his former self.

“You’ve been asleep for almost a month,” Owain says at last. “Severa and I were beginning to think we’d have to leave without you.”

Inigo exhales. He tries to sit up, but the moment he does there is a searing pain in his gut that forces him to lie back down. There is a bandage wrapped neatly around his middle; when he touches it he can feel the wound underneath. It will likely leave a scar. He wonders what Xander would think of it. He imagines Xander’s face, his furrowed brow and the tightness in the corners of mouth. He imagines Xander smiling at him when he finds out he’s finally awake, open and relieved and beautiful.

“Where is my liege?” Inigo asks. The words rattle in his throat; his voice does not sound like his voice. Owain looks at him, his eyes very wide.

“You don’t know?” he says, softly.

“Know what?” Inigo replies.

Owain opens his mouth, but no words come out.

“Lord Xander is,” Owain says, and then stops.

And then suddenly, Inigo remembers.

-

He remembers this: Xander’s face, the first time he’d sparred with Inigo. The way his cynicism had melted easily into an impressed grin. (It was the first time Inigo had seen him smile; he’d almost dropped his sword right there and then. In hindsight it was probably a good thing he’d caught himself in time.) Xander’s voice, low and smooth when he’d asked Inigo to be his retainer. The way his palm had felt, calloused and firm when they shook hands afterwards.

He remembers: observing Xander from the sidelines. The way his ramrod-straight posture and the frown lines marring his face would disappear whenever he spoke to any of his siblings: solidarity with Camilla, contentment with Leo, warm affection with Elise. But it was always Corrin who was special—Inigo remembers watching one of Xander and Corrin’s training matches, the way he’d looked at her afterwards, how his gaze had softened as he smiled. He remembers wondering, then, what it would be like to have Xander look at him the same way.

He remembers: Corrin’s betrayal. He remembers Xander withdrawing into himself. He remembers Peri’s concern, remembers how Xander stopped smiling altogether. He remembers falling into Xander’s bed, offering a warm body to help Xander forget, if only just for a moment, except that was all selfish on his part, wasn’t it: selfishness under the guise of comfort, and maybe that was the worst part of it all, the fact that he let Xander use him, touch him and hold him even though he knew it wasn’t supposed to mean anything at all, even though he so desperately _wanted_ it to mean something—

And then he remembers this: Xander’s voice when he’d issued his final order, _do not leave this room_ , how his hands had been shaking even as he gripped the hilt of his sword. Lady Elise, cold and unmoving, blood slowly seeping through the fabric of her dress. He remembers being faced down by enemy soldiers, three against one, and he remembers, with an almost blinding clarity, a single thought: _I would rather die than live in a world without him._

Except he didn’t die. He’s alive. Peri is dead, Xander is dead, and he is somehow, _somehow_ alive.

Inigo buries his face in his hands, and for the first time since he left Ylisse, he weeps.

-

Even after he wakes up, he is practically an invalid. He cannot walk. He can barely feed himself. He stays in bed for two weeks before he decides enough is enough, and then he gets the healers to help him walk, grips onto their arms while he forces himself to _move_ , one foot in front of the other, muscles straining after far too long of lying in a bed, helpless and weak and numb.

Severa comes to visit him; she sits next to his bed, silent and sullen, shoulders hunched, face cast downwards.

Eventually she says, “You know it wouldn’t have worked out anyway, right? You’d have left eventually, to come home with us.”

 _If Lord Xander had asked me to stay, I wouldn’t even have hesitated,_ he thinks.

Instead he just nods. Severa takes his hand in hers, rubs her thumb over his skin.

“Do you miss Lady Camilla?” he asks, suddenly. Severa’s breath hitches.

It takes a moment for her to catch her breath again. She turns to look at him. Her eyes are so very sad.

“Every single day,” she says. Her lips quirk into a smile.

“Still,” she continues. “It isn’t quite the same as you.”

Inigo laughs, except it’s more of a sharp exhale than genuine laughter. He turns away, sinks back into his pillows. Not the same, because Camilla is alive, albeit missing, somewhere far away from the castle and perhaps even from the kingdom. Not the same, because Severa can still _hope_ that she returns, hope based on the foundation of reality. Not the same, because Inigo loved Xander, loved him in a way that a retainer is never meant to love his liege.

No, not the same at all.

He shuts his eyes, and does not wonder about what might have been.

-

He hears news of the ongoing rehabilitation process from the healers and from the friends who come to visit him. Owain tells him about the projects Prince—no, _King_ Leo is overseeing, from the citizens in the heart of Nohr to the far-flung lands King Garon had annexed. There are problems that cannot be fixed even with the treaty with Hoshido signed and sealed. There is a lack of food, and rebels continue to create havoc for the Nohrian army, and the new king bears it all with nothing more than a furrowed brow and a stiff upper lip. It reminds Inigo so much of Xander that he cannot even bear to look at Leo’s face when he comes to visit Inigo in the infirmary, his mouth a thin line when he thanks Inigo for his services to the late Prince Xander, except they’re both thinking _but you couldn’t save him in the end could you_ though neither of them will say it out loud.

Leo looks exhausted, and so does Owain. (Once, when it is very late at night and Owain is sitting at the foot of Inigo’s bed, he tells Inigo, “I think I cannot bear to leave Lord Leo behind.” Inigo does not say anything in response, but he understands nonetheless.)

Severa tells him about the other retainers: Effie and Arthur, now relegated as generals in the Nohrian army. Niles, who now lives in an almost constant state of worry. No one knows where Beruka is. She might be with Camilla, or she might be dead. Severa tells him about the Hoshidan royals who come to Nohr often now, King Ryoma silent and stolid, Prince Takumi bristly and brash. Corrin comes to visit as well, and Inigo is surprised to find that he does not hate her. Or rather, he has exhausted so much of his energy that he no longer finds the strength within himself to feel hate.

She does not visit him. It is likely she does not even know who he is.

“Don’t worry,” Severa tells him, her palm cool against his forehead. “We’ll be going home soon.”

She says it like it’s meant to be comforting. Instead, it just sinks into the pit of his stomach like dread.

-

Eventually, Inigo learns to walk again. It is a slow and grueling process, but he teaches himself to be independent again: eat, walk, dress himself, pretend he isn’t still wallowing in grief. And he knows that once he is able to move around again, it is time for them to go.

Owain writes a letter. He tells Leo about himself, about his _real_ self. His real name, his hometown, tells him about the wars he has fought in and how he had had to watch his mother die right in front of him. He tells him why he has to leave. He tells him, _please forgive me, milord. I wish I did not have to go._ He leaves the letter on Leo’s study, one night when the castle is still and quiet, before he slips out through the gates with Severa and Inigo in tow.

Severa doesn’t leave anything behind. Neither does Inigo. He no longer has any reason to.

-

A long time ago, when the war was still being waged, Inigo had let Xander press him into silk sheets, Xander's hands leaving imprints on his hips, red marks that would stay there for days. He’d let Xander put his lips against the column of his neck, teeth scraping against pale skin. He’d dug his fingers into the muscles along Xander’s back, crossed his ankles over where his legs were flung over Xander’s shoulders, thrown his head back and moaned as Xander fucked him, fast and hurried and ungentle.

Afterwards, when they were lying there together, when Inigo curled into Xander’s chest and Xander had his arms wound around Inigo’s waist, he said, “Milord, I lo—”

Xander kissed him then, pressed his lips against Inigo’s and swallowed the words that were about to leave his mouth. Xander kissed him until Inigo was breathless and sated, and when they finally parted he did not speak of it again.

It’s strange, Inigo reflects now in hindsight, which memories end up being the ones that really stick.

-

When they return home, they are all hailed as heroes. His mother is there; she wraps him in her slender arms, puts her face against his cheek and whispers, “I’m so proud of you, my son.”

Inigo hugs her back, and closes his eyes.


End file.
